Art and the City: Antiquity to Renaissance (In-Person)

As cities developed in the Middle East and then Europe, the arts increasingly came to symbolize their wealth and power. Changing urban conditions influenced the development of the arts, while painters, sculptors and architects shaped the city environment.

Even after the fall of Greece's empire, Athens retained its prestige as the cultural centre of the ancient world, and its artists provided models for sculpture and architecture that endured for thousands of years.  Perhaps no city before or since has matched the grandeur of Rome, yet in the fourth century Constantine sought to make his new capital Constantinople into an imperial capital every bit as glorious. Over the centuries, Constantinople's magnificence became a source of myth, envy and greed.  Elsewhere in northern Europe and around the Mediterranean, other cities both Christian and Islamic emerged as centres of art and architecture. We consider these and other cities and the impact on the arts of developments in religion, power and trade.

Love the sound of this course?  Look out for the next instalment Art and the City: Renaissance to Early Modern coming up in January 2026.